My Portals of Patience

By Daniel Smith

The violence, confl icts, senseless wars, divorces and many other evil activities against each other globally is the lack of patience. The world is facing such atrocities and wickedness because of selfishness, greed, then also people are not ready to understand each other. This small book exposes some of the weaknesses that fi ght against our patience and some strengths which can enhance our patience. It is a book for all who are ready to notice how our impatience can destroy good intentions and also how we can build a society who are ready to embrace each other regardless of colour, religion, age, or sex. Even though the book targets Christians, I should think that politicians, statesmen, married couples, legal institutions and other stakeholders can largely benefi t from reading it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Feb 28, 2015
• ISBN: 9781499095920

Daniel Smith

Daniel Smith is a non-fiction author and editor who has written across a range of subjects, including politics, economics and social history. He is the author of The Little Book of Big Ideas: 150 Concepts and Breakthroughs that Transformed History and the 'How to Think Like ...' series for Michael O'Mara Books, which has been published in 25 languages and sold over 500,000 copies worldwide. He is also a scriptwriter for the award-winning podcast series, Real Dictators and A Short History of . . . He lives in London with his wife and two children.

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Copyright © 2015 by Rev. Daniel Smith.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2015903194

ISBN:   Hardcover         978-1-4990-9591-3

             Softcover         978-1-4990-9590-6

             eBook               978-1-4990-9592-0

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without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorised Version). First published in 1611. Quoted from the KJV Classic Reference Bible, Copyright © 1983 by The Zondervan

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Rev. date: 02/26/2015

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CONTENTS

Genuine Portals – The Prelude

Chapter 1 Mother Of Impatience

Chapter 2 A Chip Off The Old Block

Chapter 3 Mixture Of Faith And Patience

Chapter 4 Joseph’s Final Exams

Chapter 5 Abigail Meets David

Chapter 6 Esther The Heroine

Chapter 7 His Absolute Love

Chapter 8 The Little Foxes In Judges Chapter 15

Chapter 9 Waiting As A String Of Patience

Chapter 10 What My Mother Told Me

Chapter 11 Patience As A Moral Strength

Chapter 12 Painful Patience Attitude

Chapter 13 Silver Linings

Chapter 14 The Ingredients Of Patience

Chapter 15 Sharing My Impatience Experience

Chapter 16 A Funny Episode

Chapter 17 Conclusion Of The Whole Matter

Chapter 18 Esau’s Regret Of His Impatience

Chapter 19 King Solomon’s Advice

Acknowledgments

References

GENUINE PORTALS –

THE PRELUDE

Quite too often, such beautiful and powerful virtue for good living does not attract our attention – patience. We ignore to take closer look at its effectiveness within our normal living environment. However, Cato the Elder (234 BC–149 BC) rightly stated that patience is the greatest of all virtues.

So also John Florio (1578) in his poem could say confidently that.

‘Patience is the best medicine that is, for a sick man, the most precious plaster that is, for any wound. Patience comforts the poor, heals the sick, it eases the afflicted, contents your friends, annoys your enemies, helps all men, hurts no man; it is a great thing to find one man that is patient’. It is a good remedy.

It is also known as the capacity for calmly enduring pain, trying situations, or trying circumstances with even temper, tolerance, and understanding. Patience also is known to be capable of accepting delay with equanimity, that is to be persevering or diligent.

We now have the idea of what the virtue patience is all about. We need also have to understand it the way it affects our moral life. The Bible has a few definitions for our knowledge.

A Bible commentary defines it as a period of waiting that may try the patience of some and tempt them to grumble or blame each other for their troubles. Titus Mencius Plautus (254 BC–184 BC) was of the opinion that ‘patience is the best remedy for every trouble’.

A thought remains that lack of patience is throwing the world into a serious de facto bleeding world full of wars, looking at what is happening in the Middle East, Russia, and the Ukraine, then terrorism sneaking into almost every nation. The time has come for every individual to rethink how our impatience is becoming a menace.

CHAPTER 1

Mother of Impatience

The episode in Genesis chapter 3 about our great-great-grandmother Eve opens our mind to the fact that she was impatient. She had been informed about the beautiful plans of God for her generation. Though she was not there when God briefed Adam about the future plans, it was not an excuse for her to allow the serpent to deceive her. Maybe she intended to know more about her environment, and that landed her into a big snare. May we agree that she was unnecessarily inquisitive? Over-pursuance of knowledge, I call it! She was told what she should not do and where her limit of movements ended. I don’t think Adam refused to open up to her concerning things God had told him. Sometimes, we make attempts to go beyond things we are not supposed to achieve. Through such efforts, we meet a series of troubles (Prov. 18: 1–3).

Adam had told Eve about the tree, which had a forbidden fruit. She was aware of the consequences and perhaps had told Adam: ‘As for me, I will not make the attempt to go near it.’ Quite well; if she wanted to be sure of what Adam had told her and was doubtful, why couldn’t she ask God when He visited them ‘at the cool of the day’? Indeed, she was not able to endure the temptation of watching the tree. Again, she hurriedly listened to the deceitful words of the serpent, to her detriment. Most of the time, we find it very difficult to succumb to pressures. We are not able to last as far as endurance is concerned. I wish to differ from the reason that Eve was a ‘weaker vessel’. She was just impatient and it caused her shame; and posterity is not able to forgive her. Any of us could have been her. However, today, we have the Grace of Jesus to tread on to avoid such a mistake. Nevertheless, we need to be aware that the serpent had gone out in so many ways to try our impatience. Impatience can cause our downfall; it can as well have us miss greater opportunities that can never be gained. But patience can be a good medicine for possessing a great man’s heart. In any event, we thank God that He came down to restore what we lost through our mum Eve, out of impatience.

Sarah Asked, For How Long?

Old age was telling much on Abraham and Sarah. God’s promises for him to have many children with Sarah had not been fulfilled. Sarah especially began to witness a sense of rejection within her. She looked through her womanhood and found no fault. Abraham had not blamed it on her for not bearing a child. So what happened? For a little psychological fact about Sarah, there was a natural drive within her, which she did not appropriate well. She did not properly adjust herself to the situation. She lost contact with her own feelings. She thought her maid had a better stand than she had. She could not reflect on the day they were promised of being ‘mother’ and ‘father of many nations’. She was not a failure until she decided negatively. Her limitation to impossibilities at that time could not stand against the test of endurance. It was too much for her. As for Abraham, he was relaxing, ‘looking unto Him, the Beginner and the Finisher of faith’. Most women, as well as men, therefore, always worry themselves in things which God could have done for them, no matter the length of time. I believe that. Some women of today, through strong Christian teachings, have a cultivation-orientated mind of maintaining positive ideas.

Sarah allowed herself to oppose her patience to fury: Perhaps she was asking herself, ‘For how long shall I continue to be in this state of shame and reproach?’ Each birthday in her life was full of expectations; especially the fortieth was the end of her hopes. She had bypassed a fixed age, and soon, the same episode in the Garden of Eden will unfold. She consulted herself or her ego (one best enemy of humankind) and agreed to suggest to Abraham something I think was not conducive. In the beginning, she armed herself with patience, but how could she bring up such an opinion as ‘go into my maid’ as she told Abraham to do (Gen. 10: 1–6)? Sarah limited God to her own understanding instead of maintaining her focus on the promises of God. Well, she would have been instructed by Apostle Peter, saying, ‘A day is like a thousand years and thousand years like a day’ to God. She missed this wonderful and important antidote to waiting. A reverend minister once said, ‘Whereas you are reading the normal calendar on your wall, God had prepared His own calendar for you, which is far different from what people are using.’ In effect, he was expressing the idea of endurance and waiting for the right time to appear. Sarah was a victim of circumstances. You and I could have done the same. But today, the Bible says, ‘If ye hear His voice, harden not your heart.’ Let us take a cue from this episode.

To me, Abraham had a problem. ‘Like father, like son.’ When Sarah suggested to him to ‘go into’ the maid, he behaved just like Adam, who took some of the forbidden fruit from Eve and ate. Abraham’s problem was the virtue of love and passion of sympathy he had for Sarah mixed with his faith he had in God (our poor ‘Father of Faith’). Today, that error is causing a lot of commotion around the world. No one is to blame. However, be it known to all of us that ‘pains in discipline weigh in grams but pains in regrets weigh in kilograms’.

What about Abraham?

When